The refurbished ones on the Apple site are $1K in Canada. (Note that the exchange rate doesn't really bear the cost difference.) I was hoping to get away with cheaper.
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Totally understood. The stock of reconditioned ones is also always changing. I just purchased 9 Mac Minis for $509 and now those aren't on the site.
I'm on my second Toshiba and am pleased with it.
I am very happy with my Toshibas. The big laptop I bought in 2007 as a desktop replacement and the small laptop I bought in 2010 for travel are both going strong.
Whatever you get, I recommend Windows 8 only if the machine has a touch screen.
I fear it will be hard to avoid Windows 8 on a new machine.
I'm in the same boat as Sue and I'm curious about memory. My needs are pretty much exactly as Sue described (surfing, email, word processing, limited gaming [nothing fancier than Candy Crush or Plants v Zombies], some TV/movie watching). How much memory is, "it'll run fine", how much is "that'll be awesome for your needs", and how much is "you REALLY don't need that much, save the $200-300 difference"?
I'd go with 4GB is fine, 8GB is more than you'll need for what you listed.
What about hard drives? I'm assuming that either the 500GB or 750GB that I'm mostly seeing are probably sufficient to my needs, and 1TB would be overkill (no matter how awesome it sounds conceptually)?
If you need extra space later, you can always get an external hard drive. Unless you're storing a lot of digital video, you don't need tons of space.
It's pretty hard to find a computer with Windows 7 in stores, you'd have to order one.
I have Windows 8.1 on my desktop computer (came with Windows 8 and I did the upgrade) and I don't mind. It starts on the desktop, the power button isn't 4 clicks away (or whatever it was) and it's different and if I had a touch screen I could use more of what Windows 8 is about but it's not bad.
I don't know about other retailers but the store I work at the minimum RAM is 4 gb and 500 GB is the minimum harddrive. The differences come in the processors, if it's a touchscreen, and if it's a 2 in 1 where it flips. That is becoming more and more common.
Also a lot of laptops don't have disc drives any more. I don't know how that is an issue, you can always get an external drive but if you use one everyday then a built in drive is better.